And Then There Was One

This happened a bit ago. It was actually a month or so before we got the Matrix, but within the window when I was already planning on buying another car. My thought was to buy a replacement, and non-op Jade, since she would likely not pass smog. Then, at my leisure, drop the oil pan and pull the cylinder head, knock the pistions out, and replace them with new ones & new rings. While I had it that far apart, I'd go ahead and get a valve job on the head, and replace the timing chain and oil pump. That would probably make it into an engine that would go another 200m to 400m miles without much issue. Probably around $750 to $1,000 in parts and machine shop work, and who knows how many of my all too brief weekends, but since it otherwise doesn't have many issues (besides the seat covers coming apart at the seams, the clear coat on the paint flaking off, and the sunroof and rear passenger side window not working) for not that much, I'd have a long lasting reliable car.

Anyway, what happened was this: We were driving home one evening on a road with 3 lanes each direction. This particular kind I don't care for, the right hand lane is available for parking... sometimes. In the evening is one of those times. We are in the middle lane, crusing along, when a Ram pickup comes flying up in the right lane, passing everyone on the right, where there's a semi trailer parked up ahead. They could slow down and drop in behind us, but do you think a passing-on-the-right jerkwad is going to do that? Nope, they just sideswipe us coming into our lane, then drop in behind us. As soon as there's room in the right lane, I do what any rational person would do, pull off to the side to get their information. Do you think a sideswiping bonehead is going to do that? That's what I thought, they just headed on, so I followed them. I had my boy write down their liscense plate number, and my wife call the law. Their attempts at evasion were fairly laughable, at the next light, they got in the left turn lane. I followed them. They got out of the left turn lane, I followed them. Where we were just before the freeway ramp we were heading for, they had gotten all the way into the right lane, and were heading as though they were going to turn into the restaurant, I was right behind them to follow them. Then, they go from the far right lane that would get onto the northbound to the next one that would go to the southbound. I followed them. When the light changed, they cut back into the northbound lanes and entered the freeway. I followed them, but this time I wasn't able to keep from getting a couple of other cars between us, and after we were on the freeway, I mistook another pickup for theirs, and at that point they got away.

Meanwhile, my wife has gotten connected to the CHP. by the time she had, I'd given up and we were headed home. They asked us to return to where it occurred, and they would send a unit out to take a report, so we doubled back. It ended up being about another hour, and based on previous experiences with hit and runs, even having the information of the other vehicle, I didn't expect anything to happen.

Fast forward a few weeks (it's blurry now, it may have been before or after we got the Matrix, but I think it was after) and out of the blue, I get a call from an insurance company about an accident I'd been involved in. I replied, "oh, the hit and run???" Yes, that was the one!!! They asked for my version (pretty much what I've related here) and they tell me they are taking full responsibility. Yeah, that seems right!!! On account of the CCP flu, the auiditor wants me to send pictures, pretty much what you see here, scrapes along the door and wheel arch, along with rubber transfer and scraping on the face of the wheel. Nothing that would be that big of a deal to repair and paint over (did I ever mention that the paint on the hood had gotten so bad that I painted it with some hammer tone paint? I don't think I did. I was considering doing the whole car with the same color since it looked pretty decent, although not a match to the Homecoming color) but they came back with the result of it being totalled!!! If we didn't retain the vehicle, they will pay us...$250 more than we'd bought it for!!! I had to think for a bit, I think it was around $500 less if we retained it, but I decided against it. Before it was towed off, I yanked off the black badges, the radio and phone holder unit, the glasspack muffler, and swapped the battery for one that wouldn't hold a charge. I left the dash cam-back up cam unit in, because it was always rather dim, and would have been a lot of work to remove. If I'd had time and inclination, I would have gotten a plain instrument cluster and held onto the Homecoming gauges. The tires were also almost new looking, I have a couple more tired tires I could have swapped on, but honestly, they are pretty cheap, and right now I don't have anything they could go on (although there's a really janky '95 SL-2 that they are only asking $800 for...)

Kind of sad to see her go. Farewell, my friend.

The Sound of Jade

Finally did this yesterday.

When we bought Jade, I quickly discovered she had the same trash can type of center muffler that Baby and 3 came with, and just like both of those, it was leaking from the crimped on end of the front. It was getting worse, to the point it would billow exhaust up around the front of the car if you were stopped for a while. I still had the first one I'd gotten for Baby, with the front and rear flanges for bolt-on interchangeability. Of course, 3 still has the glass pack, and whenever I get around to yanking the drivetrain out of her, I'll take the whole back end of the exhaust system. Yesterday I took her to the same muffler shop that had made up the original 512 Labs exhaust, and had them put in the middle muffler.

My wife had always liked how quiet Jade was, after having driven Scruffy around with her voice. I had the thought that if I removed the rear muffler, but kept the extra twists and turns over the rear axle and had it exit at the rear, it should have less volume but still have better flow. I had given them instructions to do so, but there were two customers ahead of me. That gave me time to do a little sifting through their pile of old tips, and I found this nice looking double tip. I'd wanted a double tip, if I had my choice of style, I would have something similar to the Gale Banks F-body power pack system I had on my Camaro, with the last couple feet chrome, a slight bend towards the end, and maybe a 20° slant to the very end. This isn't anything like that, but still looks good, and fills up the bumper clearance nicely. Also, the outside tip is slightly shorter that the inside one, matching the curve.

I asked how much to put it on, and it was an extra $20. I'll take it!!! The whole job ended up being $120, plus $10 tax. The price keeps going up!!! They used the strap that had held the original muffler to hang the pipe. It looked like it was a good fit where they had it positioned.

But when I got a look at it later, I realized it wasn't lined up with the body of the car. It comes out at a slant. They have a 90 day warranty, I wonder if they'll honor it to straighten it out, or if it will cost extra to have that done.

Well, it sounds good, but not significantly quieter for having it exit the back. I'll see how it is after I get the glass pack off 3 swapped in. For the first time, it actually seems like it's added some power!!!

Bool Hunt

All of my nonexistent readers are probably well aware that I end up going to the junkyard on a fairly regular basis. This post will cover a few of those trips, as well as filling in a bit of recent history.

About a month ago, I'd finally gotten Scruffy over to an alignment shop to get the rear tires pointed in the right direction. This is the only car I've ever had where I've had a rear tire wear and alignment issue, probably because nearly all of the cars I've owned have had solid rear axles where alignment isn't a thing. The others not in that category, I haven't messed with the ride height, so there's that. As you can see, they were REALLY worn down for about two years of wear!!! The alignment shop had told me that the camber was still a bit out, but to come back when I'd replaced the tires, with a little advance warning, and they would install a camber kit to correct it. Yesterday I finally got a replacement pair.

Prior to heading over there, on Friday evening, I opened up the back of the two machined look rims I'd picked up, with the idea of getting a full matching set on Scruffy, at which point I realized that the one had a significant abrasion on one opening, where it had peened the metal out, so I decided against using that one, for now. It also had quite a bit of scuffing on other areas, and I took some medium-fine sandpaper and 3M pads to one such area, to see if I could get it looking decent. Looks like all it is is through the clear coat or anodizing, whichever it has. About a half hour's work, and it came out looking quite good!!! Anyway, left that one off for now and now have 3 out of 4 the same.

Now, for a few weeks back background. The second to the last week I was working at the physical building, on Thursday they were doing Wuhan Flu testing. They were having us come in at the time of the testing, wait for the results, then, if negative, report for work. My appointment was for noon, so I got to go in a bit later. Oh yeah, spoiler alert, around 400 employees still working there, and not a single positive!!! Anyway, about a mile from home, it started running really rough, with not much power. I drove it almost to where I get on the freeway, and pulled into a gas station to see if I could see anything. Restarting it had done nothing, but plugging in the OBD scanner showed multiple misfires. I turned around to go home and switch cars, and getting to the uphill area discovered it didn't have enough juice to climb the hill. Called my wife and had her bring her car down. Used her car that day, and did a bit of research. There were several things, but the consensus was to start with the spark plugs and work your way down the systems. No idea when the plugs were last changed, but never hurts to have new ones (so long as they are OEM NGK copper core ones, not any exotic metal ones, as they have a high fail rate in Saturn 1.9 engines, due to the waste spark system they run). Also, while I was getting the plugs, I got a crankshaft position sensor, my reasoning being that the sudden failure seemed consistent with that. Replacing the plugs did nothing, so I headed back up the hill and took the plug wires, coils and ignition control module off 3, and went back down and replaced all the units on Scruffy. Viola!!! No cumbersome crankshaft position sensor replacement, which I was not looking forward to. Just to see what would happen, I put the units from Scruffy back on 3. Moved the issue to that one, as I figured it probably would. I figure it was likely the ignition control module, as I've had coils fail before, and the OBD will show the coil specific to two cylinders missing.

So, now 3 is fairly undriveable. Not like I'm driving it much anyway, but I want to be able to move her around, not to mention I'd rather have everything going if and when I swap the engine out. The ignition control module is around $85, and most of the consensus is that you are better off getting an OEM used replacement from the junkyard anyway, as most of the replacements have a high fail rate. Off to the junkyard!!! Coils are pretty reasonable, but control modules are supposed to be in the $50 to $60 range. Since the double coils mount to the module, I figured I'd pull the whole unit and try and pass it off as a coil array. I also was wondering if they were the same unit for the generation 2 and SHOC models. No one seemed to have that information, but I could probably look up different years and engines and figure that out if I wanted to. I took a look around at earlier SHOC models, and even a generation 1 SC2 and they all appear the same. Anyway, to be safe, I got them off the same year and engine SL2. Funny thing, there didn't seem to be much body damage at all, but both of the airbags had been deployed!!!

When I got to the checkout, the cashier was questioning the pricing, noting that an array would be more expensive, and it was actually two coils, which would be cheaper. He called over a supervisor, who told him to ring it up as two coils, and put the module as a bracket. He noticed it had the wire connector socket, so rang it as a electrical connector. Two coils at around $13.50 (plus $1 core charge) and $2.75 for the ignition control module!!! Score!!! The exhaust manifold was removed from the SL2 I got the goods from, which gave me a chance to get a better shot of the exhaust air injection ports. They look equally as plugged up as Scruffy's had been!!!

And there's that 1st generation SC2. While very little is common to the later ones, they weigh less, and the style is growing on me. I actually like the SC and SC1 front ends with the fixed headlights, which I believe are the same from the doors forward as the sedans.

Now, from quite a while ago when I'd gone to a junkyard near my work, and they had almost exactly the same as 3 on the other side of the wall, I imagine pre being put in the yard, but possibly to be sold. Even has the same rims as 3 originally had!!! In other news, I came across an ad for the same year, color and wheels as 3 with 95K miles, and a busted up front bumper and driver's side fender and mirror, plus a check engine light, asking $1800. I sent them a message that, considering the condition it seemed about $500 to $800 too high. I'd take that deal, if it seemed OK and could pass smog, which of course it won't with that light on.

A couple of the cars of interest there that time were this 60's Mustang with little left but the firewall and the undesirable 6 cylinder engine. It's very rare to see anything that old anymore.

Up next is a early 70's Celica, another of those you never see anywhere anymore!!! Someone had done a terrible job of putting a whale tail spoiler on the trunk, looking like it's about 20 degrees from where it should be. Has the distinction of being similar to the one we had. Of course, it has the unique pull out handles. The steering wheel was removed, but still inside, so I was also reminded of the style of the horn buttons, double circles on each of the three spokes, cheaply made so the ones rotated around it end up upside down!!!

And finally, the junkyard I went to this weekend, a while back there was this pretty nice '64-'66 Suburban in the lot. I noted it because it's similar to my GMC panel truck.

I know I've used the phrase "bool hunt" in previous posts, but I'm not sure I've ever explained it. It's from the Stephen King story, "Lisey's Story". It's where something will be hidden and the other person has to find it. Also in the story is the mention of a "blood bool", so take that for what it's worth. It's been years since I've read that one, maybe I'll dig it out, I quite enjoyed it. Stephen King is a very talented writer, but he's also an old crank who keeps yelling at the Commander in Chief to get off his lawn.

Doing Time

Strange times are upon us, such as I have never seen. The Wuhan virus has put severe restrictions on our day to day lives. The government has all but put the gas-on-a-fire economy into an induced coma. Here's to hoping it will still live once restrictions are eased.

As always, with my work, I had to map out my vacation times off at the end of last year. Of course, not having anything planned out in advance, I was just going for random chunks of time strung together. My wife said, "we never take vacations in the first part of the year, you should take some time and do that!!!" OK, I requested March 16th to 18th off, strung onto a weekend. If you're keeping track, that's right around the time things started getting real with the Wuhan virus. That didn't work out well at all!!!

A couple weeks before my vacation time came up, I'd gotten an Email from the Catalina Island Company, who were doing an off season promotion where if you bought weekday lodging at a couple of their hotels, they would provide boat travel. That sounded like a pretty good deal, and I was considering doing it. However, getting close to time, and the weather prediction was for rain there most of the time. Since it's largely a pedestrian attraction, I scrubbed that from our plans.

I figured we'd stick close to home instead, go see a movie or two, go out and get some food, maybe do some things around the house. Then the lockdown came. Movie theaters were closed, and restaurants were limited to take out. Ah well, the best laid plans and all that...

So, watched a few recent releases on TV. I'd wanted to see the latest Quentin Tarantino feature, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. It was pretty enjoyable, but I'd put some of his other works ahead of it. Maybe I just need to see it again and let it grow on me.

My wife has been wanting to see Dr. Sleep again. We'd seen it when we were on our anniversary weekend trip, right around when it came out. I'd read the book, and thought it was quite good. As far as an adaptation of a book goes, it was a pretty good job. An even better job was the melding of the original Stanley Kubrick Jack Nicholson Shining, of which this is a sequel.

Way back in 2007 I'd been bad-mouthing I Am Legend for being a poor man's Omega Man. Well, it happened to be on TV, and I checked it out. It was actually pretty good!!!

Ended up doing a few things on the cars, too. Finally took 3 to get aligned, months after replacing the tie rod ends. I'd been getting a code for a fuel tank pressure sensor on Scruffy. I got a replacement, and spent a couple days dropping the fuel tank and replacing it. It was the first time I'd done such a thing, and it was a bit of an ordeal since I didn't know that I had to completely remove one of the straps. Haven't gotten that code since, so it seems to have been a success. After that, I rotated the tires on 3, and had checked the rear brakes, where I had been getting a bit of a shudder. Figured it was probably getting time for new brake shoes, but they had lots of lining left, and it had a leaking wheel cylinder. Fortunately, I had an extra new one, so I put that in. The sealing washer was worn out, though, so finally got it finished a week later. Did an oil change on her, too. Next, I pulled the back end off Jade. I'd done the back brakes a while ago, and they didn't seem to be self-adjusting properly. Found the problem rather quickly, one of the springs I'd replaced back when I'd done them originally had broken.

We brought home a pizza one night, and another night had a frozen Jeno's East Chicago Deep Dish pizza.

Turns out my job is one of those critical services, as we supply many medical and infrastructure entities. Things are different there, but we're still going. I'm a bit jealous of the people who are having to stay home, I could get so many other things done if I were, but I think I'd rather still have an income in these uncertain times. Bonus, the traffic out there is some of the best I've ever seen!!! Double bonus, they have been having most of the office and sales forces working from home, so parking at work is also much better!!!

Last Friday I took Scruffy for a 4-wheel alignment to correct the rear tire wear it's been getting. apparently the toe settings were way off. Yesterday I began doing a piston soak on Jade, trying to use Sea Foam as the medium this time to see if it does any better. I've still been getting the P0410 code on Scruffy, so I'm trying some Sea Foam as a soak in the injector ports, too, to see if that helps.

Car Stuff

Some car stuff that's happened. First up, the previously mentioned radiator replacement on Jade. This was back in December, it started losing water pretty regularly. Gave it an inspection, and it had coolant ooze on the driver's side tank of the radiator between the transmission cooler lines, so I figured that was it.

Put a replacement in, and while I was doing that, discovered some damage to the bottom edge and the air conditioning condenser (as well as the radiator, but I took care of that!!!), probably from the time it fell off the jack!!! Fortunately, the extra clearance on both of those components doesn't appear to have affected the functionality of either of them.

So, went through all that, flushed the cooling system, and then noticed the underside of the fill cap didn't look right. That may have been all it needed.

Got myself another set of Ion rims to put on 3, as I've been wanting to do. The rims on 3 were the ones from Baby, and the tires on there were a couple years old when I swapped them on, so I've got my money's worth out of them. There's a whole story on those where they ended up costing too much, suffice it to say don't waste your money on those Goodyear mileage maximizing tires, they have such hard compound to them as to be dangerous, and I ended up getting even worse mileage with them than I'd had with a set of Chinese cheapies.

Anyway, I'd ended up getting two on the Thanksgiving weekend 40% off day, and two on the New Year's sale. Same deal as last time, I was only able to find two machined face ones, and two other painted. As you can see, one was in way worse condition!!! I was telling my dad I'd like to get the painted ones machined to match, and he made the comment, "Well, we know how to polish..." Yeah, that used to be a fair amount of my previous career. Planted the idea in my head, and I bought the discs and wheels and compound to polish, and went to work. It's too much work, but it's getting there. Still need to get an alignment from when I replaced the rod ends. Additionally, it looks like I've got one of the rear wheels on Scruffy that needs work, probably a camber kit, as it's wearing the tire back there prematurely.

And finally, that cool flat exhaust tip I made up??? The dip down to clear the emergency brake cable became the low point, and as with most lowered cars, occasionally you scrape a little. It appears it's done a bit of tweaking it up some, to where it's into the rocker panel, and it's melted it down a little. If I'm able, I'll get some aluminum tubing the same diameter and make up a metal piece with a cutout around it to give it some clearance.

Wrenchin' Weekend+

This was a couple of weekends ago.

Actually started out the Wednesday before, they had one of the hooey red flag days. I fired up the Falcon and drove it to the bottom of the hill and parked it there. Took a lot of cranking, and I flooded it and had to let it sit for a minute on the initial starting. Have I made mention that I bought a deep cycle battery for her a couple years ago??? Some of the best money I've spent on her!!! On my way home on Thursday, I took 3 to the you-scrub car wash, then drove the Falcon over and washed it off, too. Ran flawlessly.

On Friday, I finally did the rear brakes on Jade. As always, the worst part is getting the drums off. Saturday, after I got home from work, went down to drive the Falcon back up, and it wouldn't crank from the key. Huh. Popped the hood, and jumpered the start relay, and it spun with no problem. OK, maybe now it will crank. Got back in, and tried again, and it didn't crank. Had my wife make sure the gearshift didn't pop into reverse, and went back under the hood to fire it up under there, and realized I hadn't put the crank wire back on the relay!!! That fixed it!!! On Sunday I had my mechanic friend pull several bits of metal out of the rear driver's side tire on Scruffy, and plug the hole of the one that made it through. That was one of those things I've been wanting to do for a while, ever since I noticed it. Never seemed to leak any air, anyway.

Sunday afternoon, we were out in Jade, and stopped into AM/PM for some soda. Came back out, and it wouldn't crank!!! Called up my roadside assistance, and told dispatch I need a tow truck. MIGHT be able to put jumpers on it and have enough juice to get it to crank, but the battery is almost new, so I didn't think that would be the case. MIGHT be able to give the starter a few whacks and get it to crank, but probably going to need a tow. Took them an hour and a half and three calls to get someone dispatched, and about that again before they got there. In a pickup truck, with a jump-starter. He knew it probably wouldn't work, and it didn't. Called up again, and the rat bastards told me I've used up all my service calls for the year!!! Still haven't gotten any satisfaction from them yet. Called another tow service, and it was another three hours!!!

I had the driver set it down on jack stands, so it was ready to go to work on. Ended up with a middle shift on Tuesday, so I pulled the starter out after work. Exchanged it after work on Wednesday, and put it in on Friday. That went fairly easy, but the fun came afterwards. I was jacking it up to drop it off the stands, and the jack tipped over!!! The jack stand on the passengers' side was completely clear of the car, and the driver's side ended up in the exhaust tunnel. The back tire rolled up onto the wheel block. Used a scissor jack to get enough room to pull the floor jack out, and got it lifted up enough that the jack stand was... hanging from the O2 sensor wire!!!

After that, I got the rod ends I'd bought for 3 installed. I'd gotten a look at the ones on Jade while I had her up on the jack stands, and I think those were in worse shape. Today, after work, I did a bit of sanding on the rear bumper of Scruffy, and did some primer on the areas I'd done a little filling and sanding on a while back. That rear bumper and hatch are my next targets to finish up!!!

Random Triple Shot

A few things happened. Thought I'd do an instant post and cover them a little.

My uncle on my dad's side came to town. It think it's been about 45 years since I've seen him, when we'd gone on an epic family road trip hitting about 7 states. He hails from Colorado. He remembered me from before that, probably 48 or so years, when he'd visited us and I was playing dinosaur and was eating my food off the ground. Anyway, his wife of decades just recently passed, and he was out visiting my parents.

This was the front left brake line on Scruffy. I bought all the flexible lines to replace, but thus far this is the only one I've replaced. Also, it was the only one showing visible wear, so, priorities. Eventually I'll get to the others, but I've got rear brakes for Jade and rod ends for 3 (as well as that transmission temperature plug!!!) to put on, still. I've got an extra transmission fluid filter, and it would probably be a good idea to change the fluid on both of those sometime, too.

Alt 98.7 was hosting a test of new voting machines last weekend. Menace and Greg Gory were at one local to us. It was going on while I was at work, so my wife and younger went over. Now his count is 2 Menace meet ups and one Ravey, to my 1 Menace and 2 Ravey. He saw but didn't get to meet Greg. The boy isn't old enough to vote yet, but he's registered now for when he is, a young Republican. They had a bunch of sample questions for Southern California centric questions, best beach, most instagrammable, worst freeway. Favorite sports team was the Dodgers (who just this evening were knocked out of the playoffs) who took more than 50% of the vote. The two basketball teams followed, then the two football teams. I was a bit surprised that the carpetbagger Chargers had more votes than the prodigal Rams. Anyway, I see no possible way that an electronic voting system like they are rolling out could possibly have any fraud or tampering or hacking!!!

Jade Gets Shanked

Haven't done a lot about Jade here, because there hasn't been a whole lot to post about, but now I've got a couple things. A couple weeks back we were driving home one evening, and there was a loud noise from under the hood and the alternator light came on. Pretty instantly I correctly analysed the problem to be the serpentine belt to have let go. We're around 7 miles or so from home still, but on the freeway and moving pretty good, and it's been California-cold these nights, so I kept her moving with an eye on the gauges. Coming off the ramp by our home, and it made a pretty bad sound going around, so I pulled into a parking lot for a quick visual inspection. Sure enough, there's tattered belt, but nothing else seems out of sorts. I proceed home, going around the back way, which is not as steep so as not to get the engine any hotter than it already is. About halfway, it starts not going, like the engine has lost power or the transmission is slipping a lot. Parked and walked home for the other car to fetch my wife.

On my way home the next evening I pick up a new belt, then head over with my tools and a scissor jack. The belt is a little tight, but is a lot easier if you pull the top engine mount off and jack up the engine a bit. Only five nuts to pull the mount, but I'd forgotten to grab my 15mm deep socket, so it didn't come off so easy. Tried with my combo wrench, and could only get one. Oh well, I'll try just snaking it in and working the tensioner to see if I have any luck. I start trying to get the belt in position, and notice it's short an idler pulley. Hmmm... I start looking closer, and there it is, down by the crank pulley!!! I fish it out, and even find the bolt that is supposed to hold it on resting on the frame rail!!! Looks like the bearing on it has seized up, and I theorize that having done so, it unscrewed the bolt. Looks like I'm not finishing tonight (and it's just starting to rain) so I try starting her up and driving her, and she works just fine for the little bit over the hill and down to our home. The next night I picked up a pulley and finished that job off with no further issue, and she's been running fine since.

THEN, this last Friday, We're out on our way to pick the younger up from school and head out for some dinner, and as we're getting near I start hearing a tick-tick rotational noise coming from the rear right. Huh. When we arrive, I go to investigate, and as I near the offending corner, I can hear the air hissing out!!!

I check it out, and discover it feels like a spike sticking an inch or more out of the inner sidewall!!! I ask my awesome shadetree mechanic friend if he's got a local place that'll sell me a tire, and he says he's got one guy who'll set me up with a used one for $35, or another place that will sell me a new one for around $55. Of course, for $20 difference, I'm going new!!!

We head over, and since he knows the guy he goes in and asks the guy if he's got a tire for $50, and the guy right off says yeah. Should have said less!!! I say at that price I'll take two!!! That's all mounted and balanced, for just a bit more than some shops charge just for the labor!!! A bit more background, Jade had two nice Goodyears on the back when we bought her, and a couple cheapies worn off on the edges in the front, and a pretty good pull to the right. Early on, we took her for an alignment where the guy noted the disparity in tires and suggested rotating the good ones to the front, which I'd already been planning. He did so at a bargain rate.

Anyway, that's the good news, it got the bad tire. When he got it off, it turned out to be a hex driver bit that had nicely speared the sidewall. In the shot of the strut, you can see it has an area where the paint is chipped away to metal!!!

Turned out, it was a lot longer than it originally appeared!!!

Erosion

Over the weekend I changed the air filter and spark plugs on Jade. The previous weekend I'd performed a "piston soak" on it. Most S series Saturns usually end up burning oil at higher mileage, and short of taking the engine apart and drilling drain holes in the stock pistons or getting new ones, this is about the only fix. I have performed this operation many times, but had recently come across a detailed procedure. I had been using maybe a quarter ounce of Marvel Mystery Oil on previous rounds, but the procedure actually calls for about two ounces in each bore!!! That, and letting it sit for a good 24 hours or more, rotating it, and repeating it if you are able. I did so on Scruffy, but since I haven't lowered the back end, I've been holding off on the alignment, so I haven't been driving her, so I have no idea how well that's worked. Anyway, at the low miles Jade has I wouldn't have expected her to be going through much, if any, oil, but I was mistaken. Don't know how much good that's done yet, either, but while I was doing it, I noticed this!!!

I've never seen a spark plug with this much wear!!! Look at that!!! It actually burned a circle opposite the electrode!!!

The side view shows that it's considerably thinner, too.

I'm not sure if they were the originals or dealer installed replacements, but I'd bet they've been in there at least 50,000 miles. They were AC Delcos, and I think the factory ones were NGK's.

Interestingly, 3 is the only Saturn I've owned that hasn't had oil useage issues, but it's just past 90,000 miles thus far. I don't believe either of the others began with much oil use, either, but the mileage was also lower when we got them. 3 is up for an oil change, and I'm thinking I'll give her a piston soak before I do it, too, just as a preemptive measure. Also, it's nearing it's 2 year anniversary, and thus is up for it's first smog check since I've owned it. I don't predict any issues with that, but also this year Scruffy will be due. That may prove more problematic.